What Do Historians Do? (II)
Have you ever asked your students exactly what historians do? I’m teaching my department’s historiography and research methods course this term, and ‘what do historians do?’ is one of my favorite questions. No one ever asked me to think about this when I was an undergrad. Historians were quasi-mythic creatures who lived Somewhere Else, Doing History Things, and Writing Lots of Books. I knew some of my professors were historians (I was an American Studies undergrad) but other than show…